Then the day after that I fell off my bike. It was just the cherry on the cake with the week I was having!

I skated terribly on my day off and felt my heart was not in it at that point because of everything. Events of the previous few days had beaten me down. How could one race cause so many problems?

But I thought, ‘I’m going to do this [last] race for all the people who have supported me’. I honestly don’t think I’d have got through the hardest moments without that.

I never wanted to disappoint the public but felt I had. Maybe to some people it just looked like me falling over, but I was never going to settle for anything less than gold.

i felt everything I’d given to the sport had been thrown back in my face

But it wasn’t over. In the 1,000m I felt like a medal had been taken away from me as I was judged to have impeded Jianrou Li, of China, when we both fell over.

I knew the semi was like a final and that, if I could get through that, the final would be easier if anything.

What happened broke my heart. I felt I’d given everything to the sport and had it thrown back in my face.

The day after my final skate I woke up thinking, ‘I might never get an Olympic medal now and this is the way life’s going to be’. But I know I did everything I could and I’ve always craved gold, so I don’t regret not sitting back and taking a bronze.

Elise Christie in action in Sochi (Picture AP Photo/Vadim Ghirda)

It’s nice now to have the world championships just two weeks away knowing I can go and compete again without a long gap. Everyone has had such nice words for me, including Lizzy Yarnold, who was a real class act in telling me I can come back and win gold in 2018.

Regardless of what happened, I’m definitely planning for Pyeongchang and I’m determined now that Sochi won’t be my last Games.

Elise is a Sky Academy Sports Scholar. The Sports Scholarships programme supports some of Britain and Ireland’s most exciting young athletes with the aim of helping them fulfil their potential

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